The Tharwa Review

MULLAHS VERSUS BOLLYWOOD

As two Afghan TV stations hold out against a ban on Indian soap operas, analysts warn freedom of speech is at stake.
By Hafizullah Gardesh in Kabul

With two television states still battling a government ban on Indian serials regarded as too racy for local sensibilities, viewers are trying to make sense of the government’s increasingly muddled media policy.

The dispute has raised questions about who should have the moral authority to censor the airwaves, how politics influences decisions on the media, and – most importantly of all –what kind of society Afghans want.

The Ministry of Information and Culture gave private channels a deadline of April 15, later extended by a week to April 22, to stop showing certain Bollywood series on the grounds that they offended Afghan sensibilities.

The ministry demanded that five serials be taken off the air.

Two television stations, Noorin and Ariana, bowed to the ban, but Tolo, responsible for two of the series, and Afghan TV have continued to air the popular serials.

The ministry has referred Tolo TV to the prosecutor’s office, but no legal action had been launched by the time this report was published.

International Writers Festival opens in Jerusalem

Shiri Lev- Ari

JERUSALEM—In a country as conflicted as Israel, hosting a group of highly respected authors from around the world who come to talk about literature and life is not a feat to be taken for granted.

So when hundreds of people gathered in the Konrad Adenauer Conference Center Sunday for the opening of the International Writers Festival in Jerusalem, the first such meeting to take place in Israel, it looked almost like a dream.

The writers festival – which features authors including South African Nobel Prize laureate Nadine Gordimer; US Jewish writers Anita Diamant, Jonathan Safran Foer, Nicole Krauss and Nathan Englander; and writers from Portugal, the Netherlands and Albania – is taking place the same week that US President George Bush is visiting Israel.

It is also happening as the Israeli public gets riled up over the latest corruption investigation against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Nonetheless, the conference represents a snippet of normalcy in the heart of Jerusalem—or at least an aspiration toward normalcy.

The "Babel Med Music" world music forum

David Siebert

Bonn, Germany - Whoever walks through the streets of Marseille will hear languages and music from every corner of the globe. Only a few steps away from La Canebière, the city's newly-renovated splendid main boulevard, you could mistakenly believe you were in North Africa. In the dark, narrow side streets, Arab shops are lined up one beside the other and music blares from loudspeakers.

Sami Sadak, a Turkish ethnomusicologist and artistic director of "Babel Med Music," regards Marseille as the ideal staging ground for a world music festival.

"For centuries, Marseille has been the destination of immigrants from the whole of the Mediterranean region. No one lives in isolation here. People don't think of themselves as French, Algerian, or Moroccan, but first and foremost as citizens of Marseille."

In the four years since it began, the "Babel Med Music" has developed into the most important European forum for world music after WOMEX (World Music Expo) in the Spanish city of Seville.

For three full days at the end of March, the forum presented more than 100 producers, labels, and concert and tour organisers from around the world to an international audience. Each evening, the doors were opened to the general public. The program was a concert marathon with 30 bands previously little-known in Europe.

When music is the food of peace

Karin Kloosterman

TEL AVIV—It happened in Woodstock and in John Lennon and Yoko Ono's bed. When used for democratic purposes, music is a universal language that can negotiate peace.

So hopes Aaron Shneyer, a Georgetown University graduate from America. Armed with a BA in Anthropology, the 24 year-old musician and songwriter has travelled to Jerusalem on a year long MTV and Fulbright scholarship to help make music in the Middle East.

His ambitious plan is to unite Israeli and Palestinian high school youth and turn them into a recording and performing band through his project Heartbeat: Jerusalem.

Today there are 12 Muslim, Christian and Jewish high school students in the band. Despite the ongoing conflicts in Jerusalem, they meet once a week in a professional studio in the city where they jam, write songs together, and share each other's unique musical heritage.

After the auditioning process, which is ongoing, Shneyer selected rappers, musicians, singers and instrumentalists familiar with both old school and modern music. Incorporating Eastern rhythm and scales, the style of the music ranges from Israeli folk and funk, to Arab rap.

Iranian film shows that tragedy breaks down barriers

Vanessa Arrington and Kowsar Gowhari

The film Bam 6.6 weaves the drama of Tobb and Adele, a Jewish-American, with other accounts of the catastrophic natural disaster that killed more than 40,000 people and destroyed 90 percent of the buildings in the historic city of Bam, which means "high place", in southern Iran. It goes beyond the tale of these two Americans and other survivors, however, to show how quickly divisions of nationality and politics break down in the face of major tragedy.

Shared humanity and Iran's natural hospitality are constant themes throughout the film, produced and directed by Jahangir Golestan-Parast. Even before the earthquake hit, Iranians greeted the visiting American couple with open arms, treating them with warmth and kindness despite the political mistrust and animosity that exists between America and Iran. Separating people from politics is something Iranians in the film appeared to do effortlessly.

26 December 2003 was a dreadful and bitter day for all Iranians. The vast number of people killed in the magnitude-6.6 earthquake was devastating, and rescue efforts were complicated by the fact that most of the city's physical structures crumbled on top of inhabitants. The 2,000-year-old Bam Citadel, the world's largest adobe structure and a major attraction for tourists and researchers, also fell to the ground, ending centuries of beauty and grace.

Both Tobb and Adele were enthralled by the citadel. They even decided to forego their pre-paid, upscale hotel on the city's outskirts to stay in a simple guesthouse located closer to the architectural site. They were just falling asleep in a small room there when the earthquake hit.

WHITE MAGIC IN NORTHERN AFGHANISTAN

Whether it is love, money or health, Mazar-e-Sharif’s healers have the cure.
By Sayed Yaqub Ibrahimi in Mazar-e-Sharif

"Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Relieve any illness, find lost items, remove the evil eye!"

The hucksters around the beautiful Hazrat Ali shrine in Mazar-e-Sharif do a brisk business. Whether customer wants their fortune told or their life prospects improved, they will find an energetic fortune-teller or faith-healer willing to help.

Some are mullahs who enlist the power of religion for their remedies. Others claim to have traditional healing powers, handed down through generations. Still others predict the future by examining a customer’s palm.

No problem is too great or too small for the small army of faith healers, psychic advisers, and outright charlatans who populate the area around Mazar’s most famous site and earn a living by offering help to those in distress.

"I have been in love with a girl for three years," said one customer, Abdul Latif, 28. "I adore her with all my heart, but she doesn’t really like me. So for the past month I have been getting amulets from a mullah here."

The amulet is a piece of paper on which is written some verses, perhaps a few numbers, or some astrological signs. The customer is advised to wrap the charm in at least three layers of multi-coloured cloth, and then either wear it on his body, or –as in Abdul Latif’s case - place it in a strategic location.

An education in tolerance

Seth Freedman

BETHLEHEM—For the whole of Wednesday morning I was able to relegate the conflict to the back of my mind, despite being surrounded by Palestinian schoolchildren in the supposedly hostile city of Bethlehem. I had come to their school at the invitation of one of the teachers, ostensibly to watch the kids in action and write about their situation, but instead found myself commandeered and turned into an impromptu classroom assistant.

I spent four hours getting covered in felt-tip and glue, doing my best to help the children make Valentine's Day cards, despite my woeful lack of artistic talent and similar deficiency in spoken Arabic. My saving grace was my ability to write graffiti script, which turned me into an instant hit with the students—all of whom required my services to turn their cards into a bizarre blend of cartoon hearts and flowers teamed with the kind of calligraphy normally seen adorning railway bridges.

In my role as classroom Banksy, I managed to bridge the linguistic and cultural divide between myself and the children, and realised how simple it could be to do the same thing on a far larger scale—something that the school's art teacher hopes to make happen in the coming months. These were the same students who had put on the exhibition I attended a week earlier in Abu Tor, and their teacher, Sarah, has aspirations to put on a similar project in collaboration with their Israeli sister organisation.

Most of the children attending the Herman Gmeiner School in Bethlehem are residents of the nearby SOS Children's Village, which was established to provide a home to children from disadvantaged backgrounds. They take in orphans, children from abusive homes, and other youths in need, and the home is part of a worldwide network that boasts over 450 similar villages across the world—including one in Arad, near the southern city of Beersheva.

Religion and art, outrage or opportunity

Anisa Mehdi

Maplewood, New Jersey - In 1989, a photograph called "Piss Christ" by Andres Serrano, which depicted a crucifix submerged in a glass of the artist's urine, was on show at the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The exhibition received funding from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). The NEA has yet to recover from the squeeze on its funding that resulted from the public outcry that followed.

It was a big story for arts reporters, with its impact rippling beyond the NEA budget line to a whole-scale reframing of American values through "conservative Christian" and First Amendment (freedom of speech) lenses. Like Chris Ofili's painting, "The Holy Virgin Mary", that followed in 1996 (in which Mary is dotted with elephant dung), these objects of art pushed reporters and audiences alike to consider the boundary of art and offence, and to cross-examine closely held concepts of religion. The process is cleansing and healthy.

In an open letter to the NEA, Serrano – a Roman Catholic – writes, "The photograph, and the title itself, are ambiguously provocative but certainly not blasphemous…. This context is parallel to Catholicism's obsession with 'the body and blood of Christ.' It is precisely in the exploration and juxtaposition of the symbols from which Christianity draws it strength."

This kind of inquiry exercises intellectual muscles of reason and faith. Although it may be considered a "modern" phenomenon, such critiquing is common to cultures across the ages, including those of Muslims. Except for today, it seems.

~Youth Views~ Cross-cultural conversations through theatre

Simnia Singer-Sayada

New York, New York - I recently became the education coordinator for The Culture Project, a non-profit theatre company in Manhattan, whose mission is to bear witness to injustice by maximising artistic resources to stimulate challenging conversation about the most profound and urgent matters of our time. Some of these issues include exposing innocent people wrongfully imprisoned on death row, atrocities perpetrated in the Guantánamo prison camp, racial inequality in America, the fight for civil rights and the democratic inclusiveness of the American Dream, educating people about influential historical figures, a story of Nigeria's oil madness, and most recently, discussing the question of impeachment.

The Culture Project aims to convert interest, energy and engagement into a motivational demand for progressive change. Through our productions, we are committed to initiating dialogue about critical issues. We seek to inspire and participate in a national conversation, amplifying the voices of individuals, which are rarely heard and seldom considered.

The Culture Project has been involved in several productions, such as Tings Dey Happen, Rebel Voices, My Trip To Al-Qaeda, Dai, Speak Truth to Power, Women Center Stage, Border/Clash: A Litany of Desires, Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog From Iraq, Guantánamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom and Jesus Is Magic. Each piece shared personal stories that have affected individuals around the world and throughout history. Bringing to life the struggle and power of social action and change, each of these productions presented the possibility of lifting the human spirit and inciting political action.

Promoting culture and hope in Gaza

Sami Abdel-Shafi

GAZA CITY-The giant eucalyptus tree in front of the spacious yard of the Centre Culturel Français (CCF) - or French Cultural Centre - in Gaza is symbolic enough. One of the last such trees that remain in the city, it stands in living memory of Palestinian appreciation of foreign cultures and in testimony to nineteen years of genuine French cultural partnership and cooperation with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

It seems pleasantly odd that the CCF never ceased to operate but actually expanded its activities during Israel's physical occupation of the Gaza Strip, the advent of the Palestinian National Authority, and the present period of deep Palestinian division. The CCF remains in full operation in spite of the worsening situation. The French government set a refreshing trend through this affirmation that culture need not suffer the woes of politics even as its official position is at odds with the deposed government in Gaza.

Plans are under way to build a new 1,000 m2 building in 2008 on Charles de Gaulle Street, a main road in Gaza City. The structure will be built on a 2,000 m2 plot of land that was given to the CCF by the Palestinian National Authority. The new building is a direct response to the increasing demand for and growing popularity of the centre's activities over the years. It will also house the consular offices for visa and passport services as well as guest quarters for French visitors and artists who will come to participate in the planning and implementation of the centre's programmes.

But all this has not come by coincidence.

Mr. Gaetan Pellan, CCF's director, says their mantra has been sensitive awareness to Palestinian culture and a true exchange of ideas. The centre's programmes are developed in response to the community's interests in the French language, music, art, literature, cinema, and other cultural activities. None of the centre's work is carried out without continuous feedback from the centre's frequenters and French-language students.